Nature paints a masterpiece as fine as anything exhibited in the great galleries of the world.
This morning I awoke to a Monet sunrise ... a multiplicity of pinks and apricot brushed across a soft turquoise sky ... exquisitely beautiful, and fleeting. But unlike the sunrise or the crimson and white spotted toadstool that appears seemingly out of nowhere overnight and disappears just as quickly, many of natures masterpieces take many years to perfect.
Their colour and texture is laid down over months and years, like a Michelangelo ceiling.
This morning I awoke to a Monet sunrise ... a multiplicity of pinks and apricot brushed across a soft turquoise sky ... exquisitely beautiful, and fleeting. But unlike the sunrise or the crimson and white spotted toadstool that appears seemingly out of nowhere overnight and disappears just as quickly, many of natures masterpieces take many years to perfect.
Their colour and texture is laid down over months and years, like a Michelangelo ceiling.
I stood in the Sistine Chapel one day, mesmerised by the beauty of the ceiling ... the light and shade ... the colour and meticulous detail. But as I stood in awe of what floated above me, I couldn't help but wonder how Michelangelo felt as he climbed down from the scaffold at the end of each day. How must his neck and shoulders have felt after painting all day above his head?
Michelangelo didn’t want to paint the ceiling, he was a sculptor, not a painter and knew nothing about painting frescos, but the Pope insisted so he had little choice but to reluctantly agree. How hard it must have been day after day climbing that wooden scaffold and continuing the back-breaking work for which he had no passion.
It took him four years or fifty-four months to complete. The work permanently damaged his eyesight. In fact the painting took such a toll on his body he's recorded as saying, my “stomach’s squashed under my chin,” my “face makes a fine floor for droppings,” and my “spine’s all knotted from folding myself over.”
His masterpiece came at a huge personal cost.
Michelangelo didn’t want to paint the ceiling, he was a sculptor, not a painter and knew nothing about painting frescos, but the Pope insisted so he had little choice but to reluctantly agree. How hard it must have been day after day climbing that wooden scaffold and continuing the back-breaking work for which he had no passion.
It took him four years or fifty-four months to complete. The work permanently damaged his eyesight. In fact the painting took such a toll on his body he's recorded as saying, my “stomach’s squashed under my chin,” my “face makes a fine floor for droppings,” and my “spine’s all knotted from folding myself over.”
His masterpiece came at a huge personal cost.
And that's what I think when I come across a masterpiece of nature, like these wonderful bark canvases. Bark, like our skin, protects the vital living parts of the tree. Through the battering of wind and storm, attacks by insects, birds and mammals and the intrusion of fungi and epiphytes, the bark bears the brunt.
Over years ... the tree bleeds sap ... the bark weathers and sheds ... the insect makes itself at home, branches break, wounds heal ... and a thing of beauty emerges.
Over years ... the tree bleeds sap ... the bark weathers and sheds ... the insect makes itself at home, branches break, wounds heal ... and a thing of beauty emerges.
I love that the bark of every tree is unique? The fine smooth bar of Beech makes it almost impossible for insects to get a foothold. The thick rugged bark of Oak is scaly with deep grooves and ridges and susceptible to insect damage. The Angophora sheds its bark every Spring and reveals a glorious new red bark that's been silently growing underneath.
Each of us is unique and so are the storms and gales that have battered and bruised us. We bleed and weep and through it all God is creating a masterpiece underneath the rough outer coating of our everyday lives.
For we are God's masterpiece, created in the Messiah Jesus to perform good actions that God prepared long ago to be our way of life. Eph 2:10
Each of us is unique and so are the storms and gales that have battered and bruised us. We bleed and weep and through it all God is creating a masterpiece underneath the rough outer coating of our everyday lives.
For we are God's masterpiece, created in the Messiah Jesus to perform good actions that God prepared long ago to be our way of life. Eph 2:10
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